44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 6, 2023 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, I do not particularly disagree with the member's concerns about the future and Canadians being able to properly take care of themselves. What I do have a concern with is the approach taken by the opposition party as we talk about deficits.
The one key part of the economic equation that the member is missing out on when he is discussing this is economic growth. The reality is that if we can grow our economy as quickly as it has been growing, it puts us in a position to be able to take on more debt.
It is not just me saying this. Every Conservative prime minister in the past has run countless deficits. As a matter of fact, if we look at Mulroney and Harper, out of the 16 budgets they introduced, only three did not run deficits.
Can the member comment on how economic growth plays into this equation?
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Madam Speaker, when the member ran to be the leader of the NDP, did he say he would never occupy Stornoway? I was here in 2011 with the Harper majority, and the member did not say boo about Tom Mulcair occupying Stornoway.
New Democrats talk a big game, but it is always about them. There is a lack of leadership. The fact that the member makes it so personal against the member for Carleton just shows that he must be feeling the heat from the leader of the Conservative Party. I look forward to the Conservative Party being in his riding and talking about real ideas that matter to that member's riding.
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- Jun/6/23 2:37:18 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, let us talk about some facts. When COVID hit, Canada suffered the deepest recession since the Great Depression, but today unemployment is at 5%. Under Stephen Harper, the lowest unemployment got was 6%, a full percentage point higher than it is today. What else? Today, for women in their prime working years, the employment rate is more than 85%. Under Stephen Harper, the highest that ever got was 83%.
Our policies are getting Canadians back to work. That is what they need.
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Mr. Speaker, I remember the 10 dismal, terrible years under the Harper regime, when there was no support at all for child care in this country.
It is time now for things to change for child care. The NDP has been a strong advocate for putting in place agreements that would actually allow parents, who are sometimes paying up to $2,000 a month, that relief. This is part of the NDP package that includes dental care, the grocery rebate and affordable housing. These are things that opposition parties should be working on. Tragically, we have seen the Conservatives block every single piece of legislation that would actually benefit people. While NDP members, the worker bees of Parliament, have been working hard to actually make sure the government does the right thing, Conservatives have blocked everything.
Would my colleague tell us why the Conservatives would block something as valuable as child care? It just does not make sense when we know the needs of parents and families right across this country.
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Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague's question is one that stumps all of us.
During the report stage debate, the Conservatives kept saying that they care about child care, yet they were doing everything they could to delay the advance of Bill C-35. We believe very strongly in making sure this legislation is in place.
As my hon. colleague was referring to, one of the very first things that former prime minister Harper did when he formed government in 2006 was rip up the child care agreements with provinces and territories. We hope that Bill C-35 would make it harder for a future Conservative government do just that. Conservatives would have to justify to Canadians why they do not actually believe in providing them affordable child care.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to start by thanking the hon. Minister of Families for her work, her non-partisan spirit, and the fact that from day to day, frankly, she inspires me, so she may be annoyed to find that I cannot vote for time allocation on Bill C-35, because we need to stop using time allocation in this place as if it is routine.
I protested it when it was done to us time and time again when the Conservatives were in power. In a majority government under former prime minister Stephen Harper, it was used abusively. I knew then that if it happens once, it keeps happening, so now it is being used abusively by the Liberals.
I know there are good reasons and serious provocation behind why the governing party wants to do this. I would say to my dear friends across the aisle that it does not help when the leader of the official opposition tells the Canadian media and the Canadian public that the Conservatives are going to use every sneaky trick they can to gum up the works.
The truth of the matter is that if this place used our rules, which would be that no one is allowed to read a written speech, or if every member in this place did not fill up all the time by forever giving speeches that are not always truly inspiring but definitely take up the time, we could make this place work better.
I appeal to all sides in this place to let good legislation like Bill C-35 move through this House properly without time allocation.
A gag order is not a good idea, regardless of the party in power.
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Mr. Speaker, as someone who was here in the tail end of the decade of darkness and witnessed the Harper government run deficit after deficit after deficit, attempting to cut its way to economic growth and exhibiting a period of economic growth that was the worst since the Great Depression, I really am loath to buy into the idea that austerity and cuts can get us to prosperity. Those cuts were disproportionate in our part of the country. They struck us particularly hard. I will make absolutely no excuse and absolutely no apology for the philosophy of this government to invest in Canadians and especially in our regions.
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Mr. Speaker, I regret having to play fact check. First, on foreign direct investment, the five-year snapshot of the foreign direct investments in the last five years is upward of $1,141 billion, so over $1 trillion is an average. In the Harper years, it was almost half of that, $617 billion over a five-year period per year. On foreign direct investment, there is really no comparing the federal Liberal government to the Conservative government. The Conservatives were just not able to attract the same level of investment.
Second, I am not sure why the member wants to compare COVID-19 to opioid deaths. However, more Canadians did die from COVID-19, tragically, than opioids. Opioids have consumed far too many lives in this country and we need to find solutions for both treatment and more safe supply. It is not a simple solution. It is complex.
Last, the member opposite lives in a province with carbon pricing, which has effectively demonstrated an ability to reduce carbon emissions. He ran on it in the last election. Will he stand up and tell his constituents that he no longer believes in carbon pricing?
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Madam Speaker, Canada can only gain from drawing inspiration from a model implemented in Quebec.
Earlier, I ended my speech by talking about a study done by economists who found that, in only a few years, this model helped increase women's participation in the workforce from 66% to 79%. I think those numbers are striking.
Furthermore, I would say that sadly, Conservative governments have questioned bills where the federal government was drawing inspiration from what was being done in Quebec. It was Stephen Harper's government, and it is Mr. Poilièvre himself who said that, once elected to government, he would dismantle this bill—
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Madam Speaker, there are two things I would say.
One is that the Harper government did do that with $100 a month, but it did not create the kinds of spaces that are required to meet demand, both for the sake of Canadian working families and for employers who want to see more workers available in the labour market.
I would add that one of the biggest beneficiaries of the child care program is actually employers. The New Democrats have been arguing for some time that Canada should not have a bottom-of-the-barrel corporate tax rate of 15%. We are quite open to the idea of having a higher corporate tax rate and ensuring that it is the employers who will be benefiting from having more workers available in the economy who are helping to pay for these child care investments.
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